So, President Rouhani of Iran, how did you
like those big white boxes they showed you on your visit this week to Rome's
Capitoline Museum?
You knew, of course, that they had been put
there to spare your blushes, to hide the -- gasp! -- nude statues on display.
But did you realise how much harm those boxes did to the cause of fostering
better relations between Iran and the West?
Some idiot official in Rome seems to have
decided that it was essential to ensure that you were not offended by the
statues (the Italian press have identified a protocol official in the prime
minister's office). In doing so, however, the Italians managed to offend just
about everyone else, by giving the impression that there is something shameful,
or embarrassing, about some of Europe's greatest artistic treasures.
Look, I understand that diplomacy requires
compromise, especially if there's the smell of billions of dollars of new trade
contracts in the air. If you prefer to attend State banquets at which no
alcohol is served, OK, fine. I can live with it, although I much prefer the French
approach. No wine? No banquet. Your choice.
In Rome, officials could so easily have
found a way round the issue of whether or not you should risk walking past
marble statues showing their bulges and dangly bits. They could have asked. Is
it a problem? If so, we'll find somewhere else for you to visit, somewhere with
no statues.
What they did instead was provide
Islamophobes with yet more ammunition with which to deepen the gulf of
misunderstanding between two cultural traditions. Look at these Muslims: they
even force us to cover up our own works of art. Talk about an own goal …
The essence of freedom is choice. You can
choose not to admire nude statues; I can choose the opposite. But no freedom is
absolute, so there are lines to be drawn, lines that define basic, universal
human rights that transcend different cultures. That is why there is a
universal declaration of human rights, to which all cultures can subscribe:
everyone is born free and equal, regardless of race, colour, sex, language, religion,
national or social origin; no one has the right to enslave or torture; everyone
has the right to a fair trial.
So choices do have to be limited. I cannot
choose to drive at 100 miles per hour along a crowded city street, nor can I
choose to mutilate my daughters or force them to marry someone against their
will. Societies draw up rules to enable them to function as a cohesive whole,
and those rules reflect the consensus view of the society's members, agreed
over time.
In which case, what do we make of what
looks like the entirely unnecessary intervention by the chief schools inspector
Sir Michael Wilshaw about the wearing of the niqab, or full face veil, in English schools? He's agin it, and so
am I, but given that only an infinitesimal number of Muslim schoolgirls do wear
a niqab, it's hard to see why he felt
the need to issue an edict about it and threaten to punish schools that
disagree. It was yet another own goal, again deepening the gulf between
Muslims, including those who wouldn't dream of wearing a niqab, and non-Muslims.
(Glossary of terms: a niqab is a piece of black cloth that covers the entire face with
the exception of the eyes; a hijab is
a headscarf, designed to cover a woman's hair; a burqa is a full length gown, often pale blue, which includes a full
face veil, mainly worn in Afghanistan and parts of Pakistan and India.)
I last wrote about the niqab 16 months ago -- and what I said then was that, with some
exceptions, what people choose to wear is nothing to do with anyone else. In a
school it's different, because even schools that don't insist on a uniform
still have dress codes. Boob tubes are out, and hoodies are verboten, as are face piercings and
brightly coloured dyed hair.
Let's be clear: wearing a niqab is not regarded as a religious
requirement by the vast majority of Muslims. Even in President Rouhani's Iran,
women do not cover their faces. It is a cultural tradition with its origins in
the Arabian peninsula, exported by preachers who follow the teachings of wahhabism. If a girl attending a British
school, or her family, insist that her face must be covered, they can be
politely advised that the school's dress code requires otherwise and that if they
find that unacceptable, they are free to look for another school.
To show respect for someone else's beliefs
or traditions is not the same as to capitulate to them. The officials at the
Capitoline Museum in Rome were wrong to hide their nude statues, and if there
are any teachers in England who allow girls to hide their faces in the
classroom -- which I very much doubt -- they're wrong too.